Discusses the rise and present state of music education. Asserts that music educators must heed the current positive climate for arts education to make music an intrinsic component of education again. Offers suggestions for including all students in music performance, keeping abreast of new developments in music, and updating music teacher…

Describes the author's experiences and dilemmas serving as language arts teacher at an alternative education program for middle school students. Describes how students drew on popular culture to maintain their identities of "how bad I can be." Describes how bringing popular culture into the classroom to support students' learning also brought…

The Walt Disney Company's shift in ideology from conservatism to liberal multiculturalism is examined, focusing on corporate history, Disney's hegemonic dealings with Latin American and U.S. Hispanic communities, and Disney's role as cultural producer and facilitator of multiculturalism. Analysis of The Lion King points out its contributions to…

Examines strategies students and teachers can use when viewing (and countering) the universal and objective image popular culture diffuses. Focuses on teaching environmental/ecological issues in a grade 11 social studies classroom. Suggests that students must engage texts by "writing themselves" to the conversations these texts initiate.…

Describes a simulation based on the popular television show "Survivor" in which students work in groups and study physiological needs for human survival. Focuses on communication skills, problem solving, and cooperative learning. (YDS)

It is argued that a positive response to lifelong learning policies involves the use of imaginative curriculum design in order to attract learners from disadvantaged backgrounds who are otherwise alienated from higher education. In this article a case study is presented based on the popularity of science fiction within popular culture, beginning…

Culture offers people suggestions for dealing with life's vicissitudes, and people find different suggestions in different cultures. In a multicultural society, they have a variety of alternatives to choose among: ethnicities, regionalisms, lifestyles, religious movements, occupations, hobbies, and more. In American society, the groups that are…

This paper is an introductory survey of the evolution of multiculturalism in Britain and Germany over the past two centuries. The historical approach argues that the main determinants of difference between these nation states lie in their long-term traditional attitudes towards immigrants and ethnic minorities. It focuses upon the patterns of…

In this article, the author discusses the "Digital Underground Storytelling for Youth" (DUSTY), a collection of after-school, evening, and summer programs that is a university-community collaborative aimed at closing the "digital divide." At DUSTY the goal is to position participants to tell stories about self and community, and to use those…

Even the youngest readers and writers in today's classrooms can benefit enormously from engagement with a wide range of traditional and nontraditional texts. This teacher-friendly handbook is packed with creative strategies for introducing K-3 students to fiction, poetry, and plays; informational texts; graphic novels; digital storytelling;…

Theme-based tests provide an assessment tool that instructs as well as provides a single general context for a broad set of biochemical concepts. A single story line connects the questions on the tests and models applications of scientific principles and biochemical knowledge in an extended scenario. Theme-based tests are based on a set of…

This article chronicles the authors' effort to construct a pedagogical exercise to help students connect food consumption to social class membership through the analysis of restaurant menus. Similar to Albers and Bach's (2003) use of music as an element of popular culture, the authors use food to convey sociological concepts related to social…

Synthesizing literature from critical pedagogy, sociocultural psychology, and cultural studies with popular cultural texts and experiences from actual classroom practice, this article conceptualizes the critical teaching of popular culture as a viable strategy to increase academic and critical literacies in urban secondary classrooms. Relying on…

This article seeks to locate hip-hop in the realm of popular culture in education. Through the use of song lyrics, the author suggests the use of rap music to provide context for the humanities and social sciences in secondary curriculum. Using a theoretical and practical lens, the article argues for the use of hip-hop and other elements of…

This monograph presents a sampling of papers delivered at a multidisciplinary conference focused on two dominant entities in African American cinema: religion and music. Papers in the monograph are grouped into three sections: the scholar's involvement in the filmmaking process, early Black theater and film, and contemporary issues in Black cinema…